1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a protector for wire harness for covering and protecting wire harness to be arranged on a vehicle floor or the like.
2. Description of the Prior Art
As shown in FIG. 1, conventionally, when a wire harness is arranged along side sills 2 of a body 1 of an automotive, a protector 3 is used in order to restrict the wiring path of the wire harness and to protect it.
The protector 3 is formed of a synthetic resin having a gutter-shape of which cross section is reversely U-shaped. The wire harness 4 is secured within the gutter shape portion of the protector 3 by winding a tape 5 for several times around the wire harness and the protector 3. The protector 3 to which the wire harness 4 is secured is fixed to the side sills 2 of the body 1 of the automotive, as shown in FIG. 2.
The protectors for wire harness of this kind are disclosed in Japanese Laid-open Utility Model Publication Nos. 100636/1977 and 100637/1977, in which a wire protecting tube to be mounted on an inner panel is shown, respectively. Another protector is also disclosed in Japanese Laid-open Utility Model Publication No. 50196/1979, which has a wire supporting body in which a wire harness is secured. This supporting body is mounted on a mounting panel through a hook and an upper open side of the supporting body is covered by a lid after wire harness is secured therein. Yet another protector is disclosed in Japanese Laid-open Utility Model Publication No. 142162/1983, in which wire harness and pipes are arranged on a shelf of an inner panel of a side sill, the upper side of the inner panel is covered by a protector, and a floor carpet is stapled onto the end of the protector.
However, in each of these protectors for the wire harness according to the prior arts, there is problem that only a primary single wire harness is secured and protected thereby. Therefore, any additional wire harness which is also desired to be mounted together cannot be secured and protected by the same protector, once the primary single wire harness has been mounted by the protector on a vehicle.
In order to solve this problem, conventionally another wire harness which is expected to be added was in advance secured together with the primary wire harness, and they were covered by a single protector. Further, a plurality of protectors for different wire harnesses have been preliminarily provided on a vehicle.
It is difficult, however, to preliminarily predict, at the time of mounting the primary wire harness, that another wire harness may become necessary. Accordingly, in the former case, the additional wire harness which may be unnecessary has to be disposed in advance. This results in the disadvantage that the labor cost for the disposing the additional wire harness as well as its material cost are increased. Further, in the latter case, a plurality of the protectors have to be mounted on a vehicle, which also results in increase of the labor cost for mounting the protectors as well as their material costs. In this respect, please note that none of the protectors for wire harness according to the prior arts as described above fails to take problems concerning another wire harness to be added later into their consideration.